


I Look Into Your Eyes And The Sky's The Limit

by justyrae



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Wooing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-01
Updated: 2018-12-01
Packaged: 2019-09-05 06:58:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16805710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justyrae/pseuds/justyrae
Summary: There's a movie playing softly on the TV but Louis isn't watching it. His eyes are on Niall and that's really how he knows. He's already in too deep.





	I Look Into Your Eyes And The Sky's The Limit

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alexenglish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alexenglish/gifts).



> OKAY SO. THIS IS ALL ALEX'S FAULT BECAUSE OF THEIR TAGS ON [THIS POST](http://mildlymaddy.tumblr.com/post/180466050332/sarcathlon-niall-holding-louis-securely-by).
> 
> DO YOU KNOW HOW HARD IT IS FOR ME TO WRITE A SHORT, UNCOMPLICATED STORY THESE DAYS??
> 
> anyway i tried and it's stupid cute. enjoy <3

There's only two days left until the Spring Dance, and it's all anyone can talk about. Louis isn't exactly sick of hearing about it, but he can admit that he'll be glad when it's over and the general hubbub of high school goes back to normal. Until Prom, that is.

He's not even sure if he's going to the Spring Dance, is the thing. He sort of wants to, but he knows this is the sort of thing that you usually ask someone to as a date, and he can't really think of anybody he'd like to ask. It'd be better if he could just go with somebody and not have it mean anything.

"You're not even _listening_ to me!"

Louis snaps out of his thoughts and wipes his right temple, which has a smear of fryer oil on it from the french fry that Niall threw at him for not paying attention. He picks up the offending fry and tosses it back onto Niall's lunch tray, laughing when Niall scoops it up and eats it like nothing happened.

"What'd I miss?" Louis asks.

"As I was _saying_ ," Niall begins again, but it's no use. Louis can't concentrate on what Niall's saying about the soccer team when he's got more important things on his mind. Their soccer team lost their last playoff game anyway so it's not like they're going to the state finals, but that hasn't stopped Niall from whining about it for the last two weeks.

Louis' eyes wander over to the table near the cafeteria doors, where a couple of girls from their class are sitting. They're selling tickets to the Spring Dance, although from the bored looks on their faces he imagines it's been a while since anybody actually came up to buy one. With just two days left, it's likely that anyone who's going has already bought their ticket.

"Are you going to the dance?" Louis asks, interrupting Niall mid-sentence.

"I-- what?" Niall blinks. "The Spring Dance?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why are you asking?" Niall laughs.

"I'm just wondering!" Louis gives him a playful shove and Niall laughs again as he rights himself. "I thought you'd ask the girl from Spanish class. What's her name?"

"The one with the glasses or the one with the red hair?" Louis gives Niall a flat look and Niall beams in response. "Either way, no. I didn't ask anybody."

"Why not? Don't you want to go?"

"Yeah, I mean… sort of? I dunno." Niall taps his fingers against his empty milk carton and shrugs his shoulders. "Maybe I'll go alone, instead. Might be more fun that way."

"Maybe," Louis says, his eyes drifting back over to the girls selling tickets. "But then you have to pay more, don't you? It's cheaper if you buy two tickets together."

"Which is _bullshit_ ," Niall says, keeping his voice low so as to not attract unwanted attention from the lunch monitors. "Making people go as couples to save money. It's not right!"

Louis laughs loudly, putting his head down on the lunch table as Niall defends his opinion. He folds his arms under his head, propping his chin on his wrist as he turns his head to look at Niall, who's still going on about capitalism and how it ruins everything.

"I never should've let you sign up for AP Government," Louis says as he aims a kick at Niall under the table. "Soon you're going to be marching on Washington and dragging me along with you."

"It'd be good for you," Niall says, tossing his balled-up napkin at Louis' head. "Besides, you'd come with me without a fight, I know you would. We go everywhere together."

"True." Louis sighs a little, and then suddenly bolts upright. "Hey. That's it."

"What's it?"

"We'll go together."

"What?" Niall blinks. "What are you talking about?"

"The Spring Dance, idiot. We'll go together." Louis grins. "That way we can save money _and_ we'll both have someone to go with, _and_ if it sucks, we'll just go back to my house and play video games or something. It's a win-win."

"You're serious."

"Yeah." Louis frowns. "What? Don't you want to go?"

"No, yeah, I do, I just…" Niall laughs. "Alright, then. It's a date."

Louis rolls his eyes. "Shut up."

"You're buying our tickets."

"Dude!"

"You asked! You buy them!" Niall cackles. "Or I'll tell the whole school you're the worst date ever."

"Shut up," Louis says, shoving Niall again with a bit more force than last time. "I'm gonna be the best date ever, you'll see."

"Yeah, yeah. Go buy the tickets, and then we'll talk."

Louis shoves his chair back and gets up from the table while Niall stays put. He's got his wallet out before he reaches the table, pulling out a ten and handing it over to one of the girls.

"Two, please." He smiles broadly and the girls share a look before one of them takes Louis' money.

"Who're you taking?" she asks, counting out Louis' change as the other girl takes two tickets out of the envelope in front of her.

"Why do you wanna know?" Louis asks, still smiling as he takes the tickets and his change. "Doing an article for the paper or something?"

"Why don't you want to tell us?" the other girl asks, and both of them are smirking at him now.

Louis doesn't give in. He just thanks them for the tickets and walks away, shaking his head as they giggle behind him.

"You owe me four bucks," he tells Niall when he sits back down at their table and slides his ticket across its surface.

"Worst date _ever_ ," Niall mutters as he takes his ticket, but he grins anyway.

"Shut up."

*

When Louis gets home from school later that afternoon, he's greeted by his gaggle of sisters. They descend on him before he's even fully through the door, asking him for after school snacks because none of them are allowed to use the oven by themselves. The twins want cookies, Lottie just wants a sandwich but she prefers her bread toasted, and Fizzy wants actual spaghetti which makes Louis just stare at her like she's grown an extra head.

"No, I'm not making you spaghetti, are you crazy?" he says as he tries to make his way into the kitchen. "Mom would kill me if you spoiled dinner like that."

"Fine," Fizzy says with a heavy sigh. "Then I want a sandwich."

"Okay, okay, I'll make sandwiches! Go… play outside, or something."

"What about cookies?" Phoebe asks.

"No cookies," Louis says, trying to be firm.

"Why no cookies?" Daisy asks. Louis makes the mistake of looking down at the twins, who look back up at him with wide eyes and matching pouts.

"One cookie. Each. _After_ your sandwich."

"Fine," they both say with a whine before they shuffle out the back door to go play in the garden. Lottie's already gone upstairs while Fizzy's in the living room with her homework on the coffee table.

Louis takes a moment to tack his ticket to the Spring Dance to the fridge for safe keeping. It would inevitably get lost in his own room and he can't bear to think of how much Niall would tease him if he actually lost the ticket and had to buy a new one.

His mom comes home just after Louis has passed out the sandwiches and is washing the dishes. She kisses him on the cheek and asks how school was, just like she does every day, and Louis replies that it was good. Nothing special to report.

"What's this?" Jay asks, and Louis turns around to see her pointing at his ticket.

"I'm going to the dance on Friday," Louis replies as he turns back around to the sink.

"Who's the lucky girl?"

Louis smirks to himself. "Niall."

"Oh, that'll be nice," Jay replies. "Are you going to match?"

Louis nearly drops the plate he's washing. "Mom!"

"What? I'm just asking."

"It's not Prom, Mom. Jeez."

"Alright, alright," Jay says as she comes up from behind and puts her hands on Louis' shoulders. "No corsage, then."

" _Mom_."

"I'm just teasing," she says, chuckling to herself as she kisses Louis' other cheek.

Before Louis can say anything else, Fizzy comes into the kitchen demanding spaghetti for dinner. Seconds later the twins come in through the back door with mud all over their shoes and the noise level in the Tomlinson house reaches its usual decibel of just loud enough that nobody can hear a damn thing.

Louis slips out of the kitchen as soon as the dishes are done, stealing away to his room upstairs and closing the door behind him. He's got a pile of homework to do before school tomorrow, but he foregoes it for the time being in favor of lying down on his bed. He can still hear his sisters downstairs but the sound of their voices is a low murmur and it's strangely comforting.

Before he knows it, he's fallen asleep.

He sees Niall in his dreams. That's nothing new, Niall's his best friend. Sometimes he dreams they're knights on medieval adventures or astronauts exploring a whole new universe. But this dream is different. This dream is just like reality.

Except he's holding Niall's hand, and it feels normal. Niall's head is on his shoulder as they sit in a field, which in real life would make Louis sneeze like crazy because of his allergies, but in the dream world they can sit there for hours without even a sniffle.

Niall lies down first and pulls Louis down with him. Louis curls up against Niall's chest, still holding his hand. Niall's talking, he's always talking about one thing or another like he doesn't know what to do with himself if he shuts up. Louis is only half listening. He's distracted by the sound of Niall's heart and the feeling of their fingers intertwined.

"You're not even _listening_ to me," Niall says as he jabs his fingers into Louis' side. Louis squirms and groans, pushing Niall's other hand away from his side.

"Sorry," he says as he tilts his head back to look up at Niall. It's familiar, the look they share, and it sends warm fuzzies down Louis' spine.

Then Niall kisses him, and it's perfect.

And then Louis wakes up.

"Lou!"

He sits up quickly, his head swimming with sleep as he sees his mom in the doorway.

"C'mon, dinner's ready." She shakes her head lightly. "I've been calling you for ten minutes."

"Sorry," Louis says as he clears his throat. "I'll, uhh, be down in a minute."

"Hurry up!"

Louis collapses back onto his bed after his mom disappears from his doorway, and tries to catch his breath. If he closes his eyes, he still sees Niall leaning in. He still feels warm fuzzies all over, most particularly below the waist which is _really_ inconvenient when he's supposed to be at the dinner table.

He breathes out sharply and opens his eyes, staring up at the ceiling. A few seconds go by before his mom's yelling his name again.

"Fuck," he groans before he pulls himself up off his bed and goes down to join his family for dinner.

*

Louis' dream sticks in his mind for the rest of the night and it's still there the next morning. He thinks about it while he's getting ready for school, when he's having breakfast with his sisters, and as he's dropping them off at preschool and middle school.

It's about a five minute drive to the high school, but Louis drives straight past it. He just needs a little more time before he sees Niall face to face.

He can miss first period without getting into trouble, all it takes is a note from his mom. Or rather, a note that _says_ it's from his mom. Louis has excellent forgery skills. He's gotten himself and Niall out of numerous detentions thanks to those skills.

 _Niall_. Crap. Louis pulls the car over into a random parking lot and shuts off the engine. He presses his forehead against the steering wheel and breathes deeply, and he's still thinking about the dream.

He's not sure what he's going to do when he sees Niall because how is he going to look Niall in the face and not think about his dream? How is he not going to think about Niall leaning in to kiss him, even though it was just a dream?

 _Maybe he won't notice_ , Louis thinks to himself. _Maybe he won't look at me and know that I dreamed about kissing him. Maybe it won't be weird._

"Fuck's sake," Louis grumbles aloud. "It's already weird."

Louis pauses for a moment. Is it weird? He turns over that thought in his head and he can't decide. On the one hand, Niall's his best friend. He loves Niall, his best friend. And on the other… he still loves Niall.

His phone buzzes loudly in his bag and Louis jumps and bangs his elbow against the driver's side door. He curses sharply as he reaches over to dig through his bag for his phone, and the moment he sees Niall's name on the screen he instinctively smiles.

_where r u 1st period started wtf dude dont ditch w/o me!!!!!!!!_

_im not ditching im comin for 2nd chill out_

Louis chuckles under his breath as his text sends, and a couple seconds later Niall replies with five thumbs up emojis and one middle finger. Louis rolls his eyes and shoves his phone back into his bag.

He tips his head back and presses it against the headrest. Niall's still his best friend. Louis can do this. He can act like nothing's changed, because nothing has. He's always loved Niall, he knows that. Now it's just… different.

"Nothing has to change," Louis murmurs to himself as he starts the car again. He pulls out of the parking lot but instead of going towards the high school, Louis heads for the other side of town.

There's a bakery there that has these special kind of glazed donuts that he knows Niall absolutely _loves_. He's going to go there and get some as a "sorry for ditching first period without telling you" present, and nothing more.

When he gets to the bakery he knows the lady behind the counter knows he's ditching school, but she's not about to turn away a customer. He buys three of the glazed donuts; two for Niall, one for him. The lady puts them in a bag and hands it over after Louis pays, and smiles at him before he leaves.

The whole way to school, Louis tells himself that it's just a normal day. He's in love with his best friend, and that's okay. It's just another normal day.

First period isn't over when Louis gets to the school, which gives him enough time to swing by his locker and write up a note. He drops by the main office to hand it over to the secretary, smiling innocently when she reads it over. She waves him off without asking any questions, and Louis takes off to wait by Niall's locker until the bell rings.

He's halfway through eating his donut when the hallways start filling up with students switching classes, and soon Niall's sauntering down the hallway with a lazy grin.

"What's in the bag?" he asks, although he definitely already knows given the bits of donut caked across Louis' face.

"Donuts. Picked 'em up just for you."

"Just for me?" Niall mimics in a high-pitched tone. He snatches the bag from Louis' outstretched hand and pumps his fist in the air after he looks inside. "Yes!"

"Does this make up for me ditching first period?" Louis asks.

"Totally," Niall replies in a muffled voice, given that he'd just stuffed an entire donut in his mouth. "Best date ever," he adds, spitting a couple of donut crumbs Louis' way.

"Told you," Louis replies. The warm fuzzies are coming back, but he keeps his mouth shut.

It's just another day.

*

By the end of the school day, Louis has a plan. Well, okay, it's more of an experiment than a plan, but it's better than nothing. He's daydreamed his way through most of his classes, most of the time thinking about what it would be like to kiss Niall for real.

He's kissed a couple girls in the last few years, but he's never kissed a boy before. It has to be the same, more or less. Niall can't seem to grow any type of facial hair so Louis doesn't have to worry about beard burn making things weird. Not to mention, Niall got his braces off a couple months ago so he also doesn't have to worry about those.

Mostly he just has to worry about what Niall might do if Louis ever works up the courage to actually kiss him. But that's not part of the experiment. Not yet, anyway.

First, Louis is going to woo him. Or try to, at least.

Niall's never had a girlfriend. Louis already has an advantage, because there's nothing to compare his wooing to. Plus, he had a quasi-girlfriend last summer for about a month, which was good practice.

(It wasn't, really. They barely saw each other and even when they were together, Louis didn't really feel anything towards her. She was nice enough and the kissing was good, but he was mostly relieved when their short relationship came to an end.)

Louis already knows all of Niall's favorite things. That should make it really easy to woo him. And if Niall catches on and it goes sour, Louis can play it off as his being an extra good friend. Nothing's going to ruin their friendship if Louis can help it.

He just wants to woo Niall for a little while. Maybe it'll work out in his favor, if he's lucky. Maybe Niall will like the wooing and he'll start wooing Louis back. Or something like that, anyway.

This experiment is flawed at best and is probably a really stupid idea, but that's sort of Louis' specialty. The only weird thing about it is that he can't tell Niall. If Louis were going to try and woo anyone else in the world, he'd tell Niall immediately. Hell, Niall would probably help in the wooing.

Louis can't tell anyone, really. Sure, his mom was totally cool about them going to the Spring Dance together, but there's a big difference between a joke and something real. (Not that them going together is a joke, by any means, but Louis isn't sure how to explain to his mom that what started out as a just friends thing has somehow turned into a more than friends thing in the span of 24 hours.)

"Stop worrying about it," he tells himself as he sits in the car outside the elementary school, waiting for his sisters to slide into the backseat. "Everything's going to be fine."

And just like that, it is. Louis swings by the supermarket with his sisters before taking them home, saying he just has to pick up a couple of things for the weekend. His sisters follow him around the store, occasionally questioning why he's buying certain snacks that they don't normally have at home.

"It's for Niall," he says to Lottie, whose face changes from confused to understanding immediately after.

"Oh. Okay." She looks at the chips in the aisle in front of her and then asks, "can we get some, too?"

"One bag," Louis compromises. Their mom will understand.

When he and his sisters get home, Louis immediately takes the snacks up to his room for safe-keeping and then returns to answer his sisters' demands that he play with them. It's good, in a way, because it takes his mind off of what he's going to do about Niall. An afternoon of pretending does quite a bit to clear his head and later that night he can approach the concept with fresh eyes.

Only… he still doesn't have a better plan than the whole snack thing. The only thing he can think about is the Spring Dance the following night.

Louis isn't going to go and buy Niall a corsage, no matter how many times he hears his mom's voice in his head. It would be too much for the Spring Dance even if they _were_ going as real dates. But Louis wants to do something a little special, he just can't figure out what.

He thinks maybe if he just sleeps on it then maybe his dreams will help him come up with something new. Predictably, in the morning he's still only got the snack idea.

It's not as easy as he thought it would be, this whole wooing thing. The best he can come up with is to fatten Niall up with snacks?! There has to be something better than that.

(Not that he thinks Niall will mind the danish Louis picked out for this morning, but that's besides the point.)

The Spring Dance is going to be special, even if it's only to Louis.

He's really trying not to overthink it, but once school's over and there are only a few more hours left until the dance starts, a sense of urgency grows ever larger. At one point he sits down at the computer with the intent to turn to Google for some answers, but even that turns out to be a dud. He doesn't really know what to Google, anyway.

_what to get your best friend when you're trying to woo him and you're both guys also you're going to a dance as friends but lowkey dates and he doesn't know i like him that way_

Louis doesn't even bother typing anything into the search bar before he gives up.

By pure dumb luck, Fizzy's making friendship bracelets when he goes downstairs. She's got a small pile going already, having been working on them they all got home from school, and he gently rifles through them until he finds the two colors he's looking for.

"Hey," she whines when he picks them up out of the pile. "Those are mine."

"Could I have these two?" Louis juts out his bottom lip. "Please?"

"But they're _mine_ ," Fizzy whines.

"These are friendship bracelets, you're not supposed to keep them all to yourself!"

"They're for _my_ friends!!"

"Well, you see this one?" Louis holds up the green one he'd picked out. "This one would be for Niall. He's your friend, isn't he?"

"Yeah," Fizzy says, her voice tentative and a little suspicious.

"And this one," he says as he brandishes the other he'd picked up, a red one, "this would be for me. Aren't I your friend?"

"You're my brother," Fizzy says with a huff.

"I'm your built-in friend," Louis replies as he puts his arm around Fizzy's shoulders. "Here to protect you from the bad stuff. I think you can spare two bracelets, don't you?"

Fizzy sighs, long-suffering and dramatic. " _Okay_."

"Thanks, Fizz." He presses a kiss to the top of her head and she goes back to making her bracelets.

He stops in the kitchen to say goodbye to his mom before he heads out, but she won't let him go quite so easily.

"What time will you be home?"

"Uhh, dunno. Eleven?"

"Will Niall be coming with you?"

"Maybe?" Louis feels his cheeks go a bit red but luckily his mom's back is turned. "We didn't really talk about it."

"He's welcome to," Jay says, "I just want to know who's sleeping under my roof."

"How about I text you when we're leaving, and I can let you know then?" Louis says before he smacks a kiss against her cheek. "I gotta go, I'm gonna be late."

"Have fun! Be safe!" Jay calls as Louis goes out the back door towards the garage.

The bracelets sit safely in his jacket pocket until he gets to Niall's house. He sends a quick text to tell Niall he's in the driveway and then starts trying to tie the red one around his wrist. His fingers aren't quite nimble enough to do it himself, which means he's still trying by the time Niall opens the passenger side door and climbs in.

"What's that?" he asks, leaning over the console to peer at Louis' wrist.

"Fizzy gave them to me," Louis answers as he pinches the green bracelet between his fingers and hands it to Niall. "There's one for you, too."

"Sick," Niall says happily as he admires it. "I'll do yours if you'll do mine."

"Deal," Louis agrees with a smile.

The dance is in full swing by the time they arrive, which means most of their schoolmates are far too busy to even notice them come into the gymnasium together. Louis notices a few heads turn in their direction but most of them turn right back around. It's not weird, seeing the two of them together. If they were holding hands, it might turn a few more heads.

Louis flexes his hands but keeps both of them firmly at his sides. It's not the time.

"I love this song!" Niall shouts when the song changes, and he takes off for the dance floor in the middle of the room. He joins the crowd and starts dancing, not caring for a minute that he doesn't have a partner.

Louis watches him for a few seconds before he turns away and goes over to the refreshments. There are a couple bowls of chips and pretzels, and a giant bowl of punch in the center. Out of the corner of his eye, Louis can see the geography teacher watching him as he hovers near the punchbowl.

(Last year he'd been accused of spiking the punch at the Winter Dance, but they hadn't been able to prove anything. Louis certainly wasn't going to own up to it, even though he absolutely had been the one to do it. Niall smuggled the flask in but Louis had been the one to pour it into the punchbowl.)

Louis fills a cup with the punch and turns towards the geography teacher, saluting him before he takes a drink. With a smirk, he turns back to the dancefloor to see Niall coming his way.

"Having fun?" he asks, his eyes darting between their teacher and Louis' cup.

"Perfectly innocent fun," Louis replies.

"Gimme some of that," Niall says as he holds out his hand for the cup. Louis passes it over and Niall takes a sip. "It was better last year," he murmurs.

Louis grins widely. "Definitely."

"Do you know what we didn't have last year?" Niall asks as he hands the cup back to Louis.

"What?"

"A photo booth."

Louis' jaw drops. "You're kidding."

"Heard about it from Jamie."

"Jamie P.?"

"No, Jamie F." Niall gestures over his shoulder. "He said it was in the hallway."

"Which hallway?" Louis asks. "Not the one we came in through."

"Duh," Niall rolls his eyes, "the other hallway, idiot."

"Then lead the way, _idiot_ ," Louis replies with a grin.

There's a short line near the photo booth, but that's okay. There's also a table set up with a mountain of props, so that more than makes up for it. Louis and Niall start pawing through them looking for the best ones to use. There are the standard ones: big glasses, fake mustaches, some wacky looking hats; but there are also a few weird ones: one lone boxing glove, a unicorn horn, and a tiny purse that looks like it belonged to a Mrs. Potato Head.

"How many times do you think we can get back in line before they make us leave?" Louis wonders aloud when it's almost their turn. Niall twists his mouth in thought and shrugs his shoulders.

"Dunno. But I'm willing to find out."

They get back into line a total of six times before there's nobody else waiting. After that, they just stay in the photo booth and keep pressing the button for a new session. It's free and completely digital so all they have to do is enter an email address for the photos to be sent after they're taken.

The two of them stay in the photo booth so long that they must've put in Louis' email address almost a hundred times. The only reason they stop taking photos at all is because a teacher whips back the curtain to let them know that the dance has ended and they need to leave.

"Party pooper," Niall grumbles as he takes the sparkly boa off from around his neck. Louis pouts as he puts the cowboy hat he was wearing back onto the table under the watchful eye of the gym teacher who surprised them.

"Go on, go home!" he says as he shoos the pair out the double doors and into the parking lot. It's past eleven and most of their classmates have already dispersed.

"What do we do now?" Louis asks, kicking at a stray pebble as they slowly walk towards the car.

"Dunno. I'm kind of hungry, though."

"Drive thru?"

Niall grins. "You read my mind."

Louis texts his mom while Niall agonizes over what to order, but within an hour they were both sitting on the couch in Louis' living room with fast food wrappers scattered about on the floor. Niall promptly slipped into a food coma after he finished his second hamburger and is currently snoring lightly with his head tipped back against the cushions.

There's a movie playing softly on the TV but Louis isn't watching it. His eyes are on Niall and that's really how he knows. He's already in too deep.

*

The following week passes without incident, which Louis counts as a good thing. He continues bringing special treats for Niall in the mornings, which Niall always happily accepts without a second thought.

But then the weekend hits and Louis knows he has to kick it up a notch if he's going to go about this wooing thing properly. The only problem is he has absolutely no idea how to do it.

One good thing is that Saturdays are Mother/Daughter days in their household, which means Louis gets the house to himself. It's a blessing since the rest of the week he's tasked with looking after his sisters, which he doesn't mind but it's really nice that he gets at least one day without having to play Barbies or go to a tea party.

Usually he can rope Niall into the tea party thing as long as snacks are involved.

This week, though, Louis is really going to use the empty house to his advantage. He's going to have peace and quiet which will be perfect for coming up with an even better wooing plan. He can totally do this, how hard can it be?

As it turns out, far harder than he expected.

It's been over an hour since his mom took his sisters off to the mall, and Louis is _nowhere near_ even one step closer to coming up with a revised plan. He just can't seem to come up with any ideas that don't sound immediately stupid when he says them out loud.

He groans as he falls onto the living room couch and presses his face into the seat cushions. He wasn't planning on taking a break, but it's all starting to feel a bit hopeless now. He can't help but think that this was a stupid idea from the beginning; Niall was never going to realize what Louis' motives were. Coming up with a new plan probably won't work at all and maybe the only solution is to give up on the whole thing and try and make himself forget that he's in love with his best friend.

He groans again. It's absolutely hopeless.

After ten minutes of being a useless lump, Louis rolls over onto his back and stares up at the ceiling.

"I could just tell him," he says aloud. Immediately after he starts laughing uproariously as if he's just heard the most hilarious joke in the world.

Telling Niall he feels the same way about boys as he does about girls is one thing. Telling Niall that he's got a crush on him is absolutely out of the question.

"I wish this wasn't so fucking hard," Louis grumbles as he presses his hands to his face. "Why can't I just go up to him and say, ‘Niall, I love you!' What's wrong with that?!"

Louis continues talking out loud to himself, going back and forth on the merits of admitting his feelings to Niall, but he's interrupted a few minutes later by a loud knock. He sits straight up on the couch, thinking for a moment that he's hearing things, and then it happens again.

"Coming!" he shouts, pulling himself together as he scrambles off of the couch and goes to see who's at the door.

As soon as the door swings back, Louis stares in bewilderment. It's Niall.

"Hey," he says, his voice surprisingly serious.

"Hi," Louis replies. He's suddenly struck with nerves and he completely forgets how to act like a normal person.

"Can I come in?" Niall asks. He chuckles a little, breaking the tension and sounding a lot more like himself than he had a moment ago.

"Yeah, of course." Louis pushes the door further open and steps aside, letting Niall into the house.

"Where are the girls?" he asks as he goes into the living room with Louis close behind.

"At the mall with my mom."

"Oh, good. That's… that's good." Niall fidgets awkwardly, picking at a stray thread on the top of one of the couch cushions.

"Are you okay?" Louis asks. "You seem weird."

"I'm not weird," Niall says quickly, pulling his hand back and stuffing it into the pocket of his hoodie.

"I didn't say you were, I said you--"

"I have to tell you something," Niall says suddenly, interrupting Louis and making him even more concerned.

"Okay?"

Niall takes a deep breath, but it doesn't help. He stays silent and he looks like he's either about to cry or vomit, and Louis doesn't like the look of it at all.

"Dude, now you're making me nervous, what the hell is going on?" Louis asks after a few minutes of silence pass by.

"I like you," Niall blurts out with a heavy breath. "Like, _like_ like you."

He nervously looks at Louis and then drops his eyes back down to the floor. Louis can't seem to make his mouth work to say anything in response, and Niall keeps going.

"I didn't know it before. Like, maybe I did, deep down, but I didn't _know_ , you know? I only really found out like this week. Maybe the Spring Dance, or maybe when you started bringing me those snacks at school, I dunno for sure." Niall shakes his head. "I know it's super weird, me saying I like like you, and I probably shouldn't have said anything at all but you're my best friend! I tell you everything, so I felt like I had to tell you this."

Niall looks at Louis again, and actually holds the eye contact this time. Unfortunately, Louis is still so taken aback by Niall's admission that he doesn't say a word.

"But, I was thinking about it, and it's okay. It's totally okay if you don't like me back, I swear. I can-- _we_ can just forget about it and go on like nothing's changed, I promise. I won't be weird or anything, I won't ever bring it up again if you say you don't like me back, okay? You just… you have to keep being my best friend, okay? I don't know what I'd do without you. You can't stop being my friend, Louis, okay?"

Louis' mind if reeling. _Niall likes him back_. This is it. This is what he was waiting for, what he was so worried about! The universe is handing him Niall on a silver platter! It's just… it's too much for Louis to handle, in all honesty. His brain goes haywire for a moment and all of a sudden, he bursts into laughter.

It is the absolute worst reaction to the situation, and Niall's face crumples.

"Dude, what the fuck?!" he shouts. "I just poured my heart out to you, and now you're laughing? You're suck a dick, I don't even know--"

Louis leans over and kisses him. Right there in his mom's living room, he kisses his best friend.

"I like like you too, you idiot," he says softly after he's pulled away.

"What?" Niall asks, dazed.

"God," Louis laughs, "I've been wooing you all week. I was literally working up the courage to tell you when you showed up at the door."

"What?" Niall laughs in disbelief. "I don't… so you mean…"

"Yeah." Louis smiles and takes Niall's face in his hands. "I like you."

Niall's cheeks turn red and he puts his hands on top of Louis'. "I like you too, Louis."

Louis leans in again, this time letting Niall be the one to close the gap between them. This kiss lasts longer than the first, giving them time to grow comfortable with each other. They're both out of breath when they finally break apart, but neither seems to mind in the least.

"Do you, umm," Louis chuckles a little as he licks his lips, "do you want something to drink?"

"Yeah," Niall replies, his voice slightly hoarse.

Louis takes his hands off of Niall's face but slips one of them into Niall's as they walk into the kitchen. Niall pauses by the fridge, tugging on Louis' hand when he tries to keep going.

"When did you put this up?" he asks as he points to a new photo on the side of the fridge. Louis laughs, feeling a bit embarrassed in spite of everything.

"Mom did, yesterday." Louis takes it down and hands it over to Niall for closer inspection.

It's Louis' favorite photo of the two of them from the bunch they took at the Spring Dance. They each have their arm around the other's neck and they're both smiling, but at each other rather than at the camera.

"She printed all of them, actually." Louis laughs again. "I couldn't stop her."

"Really?" Niall puts the photo back on the fridge and smiles at Louis. "Can I see them?"

They both sit down at the kitchen table with Louis' laptop, their chairs pulled so close together they may as well be sitting on the same one. They click through every single photo, laughing at most of them.

"Did that count as our first date?" Niall asks, his cheeks turning red again as he avoids Louis' gaze.

"It could, if you want." Louis rests his chin on Niall's shoulder, pressing his nose against Niall's neck. "Less pressure that way, don't you think?"

"Maybe," Niall replies. "I think we could do better."

"Is that a challenge?"

"Could be." Niall turns his head and kisses Louis, and they're both smiling when they pull away.

"I do have plans for a future date for us, if you're interested," Louis says as he slides his hand into Niall's and twists their fingers together. Niall's still wearing the friendship bracelet Louis gave him, and it lines up perfectly with the one around Louis' wrist.

"Yeah? What do you have in mind?"

Louis grins. "Wanna go to Prom with me?"

**Author's Note:**

> [my tumblr](http://astorytotellyourfriends.tumblr.com)


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